Tuesday, May 18, 2010

Projects Worth Rs 3009 Crore Completed for Improvement of Urban Infrastructure under JNNRUM
  
Under JNNRUM 74 projects for improvement of urban infrastructure and governance in big cities have been completed with the investment of Rs.3009 crore. The Center has approved 524 projects worth Rs.58, 283.33 crore, till May 15th, 2010 which are under various stage of implementation. Similarly for the improvement of urban infrastructure in small and medium towns, out of 763 projects of Rs.6946.90 crores approved, 114 projects have completed. The Centre has also sanctioned 15,260 buses for various states for improvement of urban transport. Orders for 14,672 have already been placed. This was revealed in a review meeting recently taken by Dr.M.Ramchandran, Secretary, and Ministry of Urban Development in New Delhi.

Most of the projects are in the area of water supply, treatment of sewerage, drainage of storm water, solid based management, preservation of water bodies, development of parking sites and improvement of urban transport as sanctioned projects for big cities include 151 projects for water supply, 110 projects sewerage.71 projects for storm water drainage, 41 for solid waste management, 94 for roads and flyovers, 19 for public transport system and 4 for preservation of water bodies. Similarly 114 completed projects in small and medium towns include 56 for water supply, 49 for road improvement, 8 for storm water drainage and one for preservation of water bodies.

Regional reviews meeting were also held recently at Chandigarh, Kolkata, Ahmedabad, Hyderabad and Raipur under the chairmanship of Dr. Ramchandran to assess the performance. Dr. Ramchandran asked the officials to finalise action plan for speedy implementation during next two years. He said that the center has made adequate provision to fulfill deficiencies in the basic urban infrastructure services; it is for the State to expedite submission of detailed projects reports to take the benefit of the scheme. He also stressed for continuous monitoring of the implementation of the projects by independent agencies.

The Government has also asked the States to implement urban reforms for the improvement of governance so that Urban Local Bodies (ULBs) become financially sound with enhanced credit rating and ability to access market capital for undertaking new programmes and expansion of services. These reforms include introduction of e-governance using IT applications like, GIS and MIS for various services provided by ULBs, reform of property tax collection system so that collection efficiency reaches at least 85 per cent within next seven years, repeal of Urban Land Ceiling Act, reform of rent control laws, nationalization of stamp duty etc. It was informed in the meeting that Andhra Pradesh, Kerala, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra and West Bengal have performed well in the implementation of urban reforms.

On the basis of performance in the implementation of infrastructure improvement projects and implementation of reforms, the Ministry has also started credit rating of the ULBs through independent professional bodies. The rating is continuously reviewed by monitoring the performance.

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